CLion 2016.3 Help

Opening, Reopening and Closing Projects

On this page:

Basics

CLion allows opening several projects simultaneously in different windows. By default, each time you open a project while another one is opened, CLion prompts you to choose whether to open the project in the same window or in a new window. If necessary, you can change this behavior using controls on the System Settings page.

In the Project Opening section of the System Settings page, choose one of the following options:

  • Open project in a new window to open a new CLion window each time a new project is opened.
  • Open project in the same window to stay in the same CLion window.
  • Confirm window to open project in to keep the default behavior and display a dialog box to choose how to open each new project.

Opening an existing project

To open an existing project

This operation refers both to the projects created in CLion, and the projects from existing sources.

  1. Do one of the following:
    • On the Welcome screen, click Open.
    • On the main menu, choose File | Open.
  2. In the Select Path dialog box, select the directory that contains the desired project.

    Important! To enable coding assistance, project must contain CMakeList.txt file. Otherwise, the project will open but no coding assistance (i.e. code completion, navigation, intention actions etc.) will be available.
    A project must use CMake build system and thus contain CMakeList.txt file that describes project structure, targets, variables, include directories, etc.

  3. Specify whether you want to open the project in a new frame, or close the current project and reuse the existing frame. Refer to the section Opening Multiple Projects for details.

Reopening a recent project

CLion keeps the history list of the recent projects, from which you can select the desired one.

When CLion starts, the most recent project reopens by default (unless this option is disabled in System Settings page of the Settings/Preferences dialog).

To reopen a recent project

  1. On the main menu, choose File | Open Recent.
  2. Select the desired project from the list of the recent ones.
  3. Specify whether you want to open the project in a new frame, or reuse the current frame.

You can also:

  • Reopen a recent project from the Welcome screen. To do that, click the project of interest in the left-hand pane where the list of your recent projects is shown. Start typing in the Welcome screen to filter the list of recent projects.
  • Terminate the project opening process, without waiting when it finishes loading, by clicking Cancel in the progress window.
  • Open projects and individual files from the command line, by specifying the project or file name as a command line argument.
  • Remove all projects from the list of recent projects File | Open Recent - Clear List.
  • Delete a certain recent project on the Welcome screen.

Closing a project

When the only open project is closed, the Welcome screen is displayed. In case of multiple projects, each one is closed with its frame.

To close a project

  • On the main menu, choose File | Close Project.

See Also

Concepts:

Last modified: 29 March 2017